Why do we call Good Friday good?

Palm Sunday is exciting – if even for just a moment, God’s people got it: Jesus is King of kings and Lord of lords!  Easter is thrilling – because the grave could not contain Jesus, we know that we too will experience his victory over death!  Sandwiched between these days of celebration is a Friday affixed to a seemingly misappropriated adjective, good.  “Black” Friday would fit well (Matt 27:45).  But, “Black Friday” is the name reserved for the day after Thanksgiving, a day that should be good.  “Good Friday” is the title we reserve for that day in history when the only righteous man who ever lived died for crimes he never committed.  Why do we call that day “good?”

As Christians we know the answer.  We call it good because the crimes (sins) that required Jesus’ death belonged to you and me.  I say “belonged” rather than “belong” because, in Christ, they are no longer ours.  “[A]s far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us” (Psalm 103:12).  In this beautiful psalm, David is believing what God would do one day in Christ, “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21).  Like a scarlet letter or a spot of cancer our sin was removed, with all due fear and shame attached to it, to be remembered no longer.  On the Cross, Jesus Christ absorbed all the wrath due me (Romans 3:25), He purchased (ransomed) you from the slave market of sin (1 Corinthians 6:19-20), He nullified the just and guilty verdict against sinners (Romans 3:26), and He reconciled us into true familial community with God (Romans 8:14-17)!  This was indeed a good day!

Let us not forget that God’s motive behind all of this was his unfathomable love for us.  The geography of Psalm 103:12 would be true because of the dimensions of the previous verse, “For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him” (Psalm 103:11).  We call Good Friday “good” because we see the full outpouring of God’s love for needy sinners.  We call Good Friday “good” because on that day the Father, for a moment, turned his back on his Son, so that for eternity he could turn his face toward us.

Everything changed on Good Friday, and what happened that day continues to change everything for those who find themselves here: “But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God” (John 1:12).  Do you believe?  Have you received what God offers?  Are you his child?  Good Friday beckons all who will hear the gracious invitation.